Biologist, faculty speak about UMass bear sighting

AMHERST, Mass. (WGGB/WSHM) - It was a spectacle of a scene over at UMass Amherst on Wednesday, where officials worked to gather a black bear spotted climbing trees outside the Mullins Center, drawing a crowd and big response from wildlife officials.
A tree looked a little different earlier, holding a 200-pound female black bear — even with school out. It was still an eventful morning at UMass Amherst, “(she) went up in one of those trees, came back down again, and then they finally kind of narrowed it down to that second tree right behind that sign,” said UMass Coordinator of Fitness Programs Greg Hannum, “it’s kind of an exciting thing to see, you don’t really get to see that in the city, never a dull moment in western Mass.”
It was around 9 a.m. that morning the bear was first spotted, a larger than average female, “originally, she was kind of on a side road and the thought was we could just get her to come out of the tree and move on,” said Dave Wattels, a biologist for Mass Wildlife.
The bear weighed between 225 and 250 pounds, and jumped from tree to tree before landing here, where officials on scene decided the best option was to immobilize the animal
The bear made its way next to the Mullins Center and was contained by noon, where it was quickly transported by truck and taken to a wooded area nearby, where it was given ice packs in order to keep it cool. Wildlife officials also attached a collar for research about a black bears tendency in more urban areas.
“Basically, she’ll be rolled into our monitoring study of our black bear population it allows us to learn about their survival, causes of mortality, reproduction, as well as habitat use,” Wattels said.
The bear was out of commission for about 3 to 4 hours this afternoon and will be released back into the wild.
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